Cornell's Garman blanks Dartmouth, setting up finals clash with Yale

Atlantic City, N.J. – Cornell goaltender Mike Garman
turned aside all 37 shots, while Sean Whitney had the
game-winner and a game-saving play as “Big Red” beat
“Big Green” 3-0 to advance to the ECAC Finals against
Yale Saturday night at Boardwalk Hall.

“They do a great job of blocking shots and you have to get
your head up and file it into the net and Sean did that on the
first one," said Mike Schafer, Cornell's head coach for the past 16
seasons.

Dartmouth goalie James Mello (photo: David
Silverman)

"Obviously we ran into penalty problems in the second period and
took a lot of our guys, and our penalty killers did a tremendous
job. I always say your best penalty killer is your goaltender and
Mike made big saves when he had to and held on in the third."

Cornell got the first power play of the game at 5:46 of the
first period and they had a few chances but Dartmouth goalie James
Mello did a nice job of keeping “Big Red” off the
scoreboard.

Cornell was getting hot towards the end of the period and
that’s when Sean Whitney wristed in a rebound past Mello to
give his team the 1-0 lead at 18:05 of the opening period.

Just 24 seconds later Mello was unable to handle a sure glove
save and that’s when Armand de Swardt swooped in and gave
them a 2-0 lead.

Cornell was being outshot by Dartmouth 12-10 after one
period.

At the 2:44 mark Cornell committed their second penalty of the
game but their PK held off the Dartmouth attack.

Cornell got their first power play of the game at 5:46 of the
middle period. Cornell had a lot of movement on their
power play but the Dartmouth PK kept them off the board keeping the
score the same.

With 7:17 to go in the second period Dartmouth had a flurry of
shots on Garman. It looked as if Whitney -- Oilers d-man Ryan
Whitney's younger sibling -- cleared it from the goal line and
then the whistle blew for the delayed penalty. Whitney got an
interference call at 12:43 as a result but Cornell’s PK stood
tall again.

Despite having a number of quality chances and holding a 24-14
edge in shots, the second period ended with
them Dartmouth trailing 2-0.

Cornell had a great 2-on-1 shorthanded opportunity with 14:02
left in the final period but Mello made that save but Dartmouth was
soon to be 0-4 on the power play.

Dartmouthdefenseman Connor Goggin had the hit of the tournament
so far when he checked Cornell’s Kirill Gotovets almost
lifting him off his skates before he hit the ice. It was a clean
hit and that seemed to wake up Cornell.

Garman was absolutely getting peppered at times in this game.
His team was being severely outshot for most of the contest yet the
Cornell netminder stood tall.

Dartmouthpulled their goalie with 2:26 to go in the game, a
gutsy move that hoped to pay some dividends as Cornell’s John
Esposito got the empty netter to ice the game 3-0.

“Our guys played really hard,” said Dartmouth head
coach, Bob Gaudet, whose dreams of a National Championship have
dimmed. “I don’t think it’s quite over
yet….We are going to play to win tomorrow... this is a very
proud program... We are going to play like everything is at stake
tomorrow. We are playing to win.”

This was the first time in ECAC history that there were two
shutouts on the same night.